Economy

What to Do About Economic Perversity

By Justin Katz | May 9, 2007 |

I agree with the Providence Journal that it is “perverse” for the CEO of a health insurance company to make one-and-a-half times the entire payroll of a 2,000-employee hospital. Considering how often Republicans and conservatives are saddled with the ideological blame for these supposed excesses of the free market, that admission may surprise some readers.…

A Philosophy of Shopping

By Justin Katz | April 11, 2007 |

Marc recently raised the question of conservative imperatives bearing on local versus big-brand shopping habits. It’s an interesting topic, because it lies at the intersection of various philosophical principles and general preferences. Chief among the principles is the acknowledgment that we must work within, rather than deny, the incomprehensible forces that govern human society. In…

Buy Local, or Buy Cheap?

By Marc Comtois | March 26, 2007 |

This snippet from the ProJo’s Robert Whitcomb got me thinking: This past Sunday’s Boston Herald detailed, in a story by Phil Restuccia, a growing movement of consumers and local businesspeople called Local First. This national group has organized 17,000 businesses around the country into 50 groups promoting their services directly to local shoppers, appealing to…

The Proof is in the Pudding: Americans DO Want “Those” Jobs

By Marc Comtois | March 19, 2007 |

I had heard last week that the recently-raided M. Bianco plant in New Bedford had opened it’s doors to applicants and that they were mobbed. As Mark Krikorian reminds, this is just another example that undercuts the claim that illegal immigrants do the jobs Americans won’t do. After the Swift meatpacking raids in Greeley. Colo.,…

If this is the Future of Republican Economic Thought, then I’m Changing my Affiliation to Whig

By Carroll Andrew Morse | March 19, 2007 |

Who says that Republican big-business types don’t care about income inequality? From Bloomberg News, via the Boston Globe…Inequality of incomes is the “critical area where capitalist systems are most vulnerable,” [Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan] said yesterday in Washington at a conference on maintaining the competitiveness of US capital markets convened by Treasury Secretary…

On Seriousness and Incentives

By Justin Katz | February 12, 2007 |

Although I’ll resist the temptation to offer snarky comments about the qualities of “serious” columnists, I will acknowledge that they aren’t apparent in Froma Harrop’s lunge into the minimum wage debate: There is a conservative worldview that people who don’t make serious money aren’t serious people. Economic incentives are for entrepreneurs. For the low-of-wage, you…

Talking Budget: Is Compromise in the Air? (Or is it just talk?)

By Marc Comtois | February 4, 2007 |

{N.B. Here at Anchor Rising, we watch (or TiVo) the local Sunday morning shows so you don’t have to. Here is a transcript of this morning’s Channel 12 Newsmakers, hosted by Steve Aveson and also features Ian Donnis of the Providence Phoenix (who has a little more, here). I’ve offered a few (very few) comments…

Kudlow: Follow the Money

By Marc Comtois | January 26, 2007 |

Economist Larry Kudlow sites a story from the NY Times, which includes this bit: The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday that union membership fell by 326,000 in 2006, to 15.4 million workers, bringing the percentage of employees in unions to 12 percent, down from 12.5 percent in 2005. Those figures are down from 20…

What Conservatives Ought to Explain to Working Families About Minimum Wages

By Justin Katz | January 14, 2007 |

Although I can’t recall any particular instances of his using it, except when helping me with my homework, I associate the phrase “think it through” with my father. It has always seemed, I suppose, to summarize a particular approach to the world — almost a philosophy — that he emphasizes. Not to leap too quickly…

Pelosi: Raise the Minimum Wage! (Er, Except if it Affects a Company in my District)

By Marc Comtois | January 12, 2007 |

Heh. Something fishy is going on: House Republicans yesterday declared “something fishy” about the major tuna company in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco district being exempted from the minimum-wage increase that Democrats approved this week. “I am shocked,” said Rep. Eric Cantor, Virginia Republican and his party’s chief deputy whip, noting that Mrs. Pelosi…